STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- For 60 years, the Skippy’s hot dog truck has parked on a grassy patch between Slater and Jefferson Avenues on Hylan Boulevard in Dongan Hills. But since a DEP project started earlier in September, Dawn LaVigne’s mobile restaurant has been in search of a new -- temporary -- home.
Its absence last week sparked social media wonderment and a flurry of emails to the Advance.
This is where the mobile food truck "Skippy's" used to be parked. DEC has come through with a project that will ease chronic flooding in the area.(Staten Island Advance/Jan Somma-Hammel)
“Skippy’s is pretty much an institution on Staten Island,” Dongan Hills resident Tom Maddeo wrote in an email to the Advance/SILive.com.
An eighth-generation Staten Islander, LaVigne has heard that sentiment often over the years.
Novembe 2013: Over the years, Ms. Bellach has developed a loyal following. (Staten Island Advance File Photo)Staten Island Advance
“People would say, ‘You and Nunzio’s are the only thing on Hylan Boulevard that haven’t changed,'" she said. In fact, her grandfather built the picnic table that accompanied the location. He made it a little too small for the average frankfurter feaster, an intentional design so that people wouldn’t camp out all day. So between the nostalgia and change in work routine it’s been a bittersweet week away from the job.
Flashback to 1988: Guy Molinari -- then a congressman -- bought hotdogs for his wife. She was hankering for a hotdog and with no time for frivolities her husband traveled from his house in Bay Terrace to get some from her favorite hotdog truck, "Skippy's." Serving it is a young Dawn LaVigne who started working on the truck at 11-years old. (Image by Tony Carannante)Staten Island Advance
LaVigne grew up working on the food truck. Skippy’s was established in 1962 by her grandparents, Jane and Robert Bellach of Midland Beach. The rounded edges of that original mobile, a 1956 Metro International, were a familiar roadside sight until Hurricane Sandy in 2012. Since then, LaVigne has operated from a 1996 Grumman, a boxy, modern vehicle that turns out red hots and the fixin’s with the family’s long-time recipes.
This image was taken in 2009. It has long been a beloved hot dog stop. (Staten Island Advance File Photo)Staten Island Advance
“I watched my other truck go underwater. It just disappeared. It was in the middle of the ocean. I lost my business. I walked around in a daze for months,” she recalled of the tragic storm. Now eight years later, this DEP project that has displaced her home serves as a stark reminder of Sandy. LaVigne completely understands the need for the water project and its importance to the Dongan Hills neighborhood as the construction is supposed to correct a chronic flooding issue.
Skippy’s hot-dog truck made its debut in 1962, with Ms. Bellach’s maternal grandparents, Robert and Jane Bellach, of Midland Beach, at the helm. (Staten Island Advance File Photo)
But she misses her customers and that manicured roadside clearing surrounded by cattails, a swath she normally mows and keeps spic-and-span.
“It’s wetlands,” explained LaVigne.
Regular hours for Skippy’s would be Monday through Saturday from about 10 a.m. til 3 p.m. She can tell the time by the traffic patterns. However, during the pandemic her hot dog-themed clock broke and there were hardly any cars on the road for awhile. She’d lose track of the time as a result and occasionally found herself working at 5 p.m. which would be unheard of under routine circumstances.
She promises to be back to the spot, hopefully by November 2021. Her son looked at the plans online and determined that the location would barely be touched after the construction.
LaVigne said, “It only looks like the sidewalks are being widened. They left the tree that my grandfather planted. They had an arborist there and they saved that tree. They took all the other trees down.”
A photo of the original proprietors of Skippy's food truck in Dongan Hills: Jane and Robert Bellach, who lived in Midland Beach. (Staten Island Advance File Photo)Staten Island Advance
She added, “My last alternative was I was going to park on Bedford and Hylan Boulevard by the old catering hall. That was perfect. And then they put a street light up this weekend. I’m still trying to find a spot that has to be safe for people getting out of their cars.” The hot dog chef said she would never poach a spot from fellow food trucker. So a prime position at the hospital in Ocean Breeze is not an option. Famous frank man Richie Caruso retired last week from his decades-old spot in Charleston on the expressway overpass. Is that a consideration?
“I don’t want to drive over there. This is my area," she said.
LaVigne loves what she does. She said, “It’s about the food, yeah, but it’s about people -- they let you into their lives. That is what it’s about. That’s when you know you’ve made it. When you become a part of somebody’s life. I’m terrible with names but if we have a conversation, very rarely do I forget.”
She doesn’t like it when customers use their cell phones while they’re supposed to have face-time with her as she takes their order.
“If they’re on the phone I say, ‘I only get five minutes of your time,'” she said, emphasizing the customer interaction. She continued, “It’s not how much you make, it’s about the people.”
For now, she’ll paint her Midland Beach house and take a break.
She said, “When you take your mind off of something, sometimes you get the answer. I’ll figure it out. I got through Sandy, I can get through this.”
Skippy’s diehard “Electric Eddie” DeGorter said he’ll go wherever LaVigne goes, that her hot dogs are the best. He said, “She knows her customers so well that when I walk up and there are people in line behind me I order pastrami on rye with a Budweiser beer. She doesn’t say anything, just gives me the tray with two chili dogs and a cream soda.”
Pamela Silvestri is Advance Food Editor. She can be reached at silvestri@siadvance.com.
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Where has Skippy’s hot dog truck gone? - SILive.com
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